When Mao Meets Youtube

That said, Beijing does have one other option: it could agree to some of the protesters' demands. Indeed, slowly, modestly, China's government has already begun to do so. Beijing has, for example, finally begun nudging Sudan to accept international peacekeepers (including a Chinese contingent) in Darfur. That said, there is no way that Beijing will be able to come to terms with all the activists, many of whom seek to alter the very nature of the regime and the political and economic system on which it is based. It's therefore almost inevitable that China's leaders will ultimately opt for a crackdown. And it's all but guaranteed that China's centralized government—which is not used to confronting well-organized, media-savvy foreigners who work through highly decentralized, international, nongovernmental organizations that know how to mobilize public opinion—will find the experience profoundly frustrating. The 2008 Olympics, in other words, promise to provide a great spectacle. And the whole world will be watching.

Naím is editor in chief of Foreign Policy magazine and the author of “Illicit: How Smugglers, Traffickers, and Copycats Are Hijacking the Global Economy.”

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